A coking installation normally has a succession or battery of coking chambers having respective coke sides opening transversely above a bench level above ground level. A quenching-car track extends longitudinally adjacent the coke sides between the outer rail and the chambers. A quenching car is displaceable along the car track underneath the portal support to receive coke pushed from the chambers. A main gangway extends longitudinally at the bench level along the coke sides of the chambers between same and the quenching-car track. A support riding on and displaceable along its own pair of tracks carries door-removing equipment, door-cleaning equipment, doorframe-cleaning equipment, and a coke guide. These devices may have built-in or external drives.
Normally, as described in German patent document 2,426,428 filed 31 May 1974 by H. Bahnsch and H. Kwasnik, the rails for the support of all the emptying and servicing equipment are provided at the bench level on the main gangway. The quenching-car rails are at ground level so that, once the chamber door has been removed, the guide can conveniently channel a pushed-out charge of coke from the coking side of this chamber across the gangway to the quenching car or onto a ramp leading to a water-filled quenching pit.
In such an arrangement the gangway is always at least partially blocked by the support, so that other equipment employed at the gangway can only work to the side of this equipment, normally only to one longitudinal side of it. Furthermore the rails on the gangway are a bother, and building the gangway sufficiently strong to support the considerable weight of the support and the servicing and emptying equipment it caries is a considerable expense.
German patent document 2,034,624 filed by F. Neuville wit a claim to the Belgian priority of 15 July 1969 and German patent 736,120 of E. Grasshoff describe a hood which rides on rails that flank those of the quenching car. The hood is a reactively light structure which is cantilevered over the gangway to a position adjacent the sides of the chambers of the coking battery. This structure, which would be insufficient to support vy door-servicing equipment, also blocks the gangway even when not in use.